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China, Korea, Japan, Hong Kong and Macau Travel ForumTouring and Holidaying in China, Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea and Macau. Tell us about your travels in these countries, are the Hong Kong Hotels all expensive? Tell us about the tourism in Hong Kong, have you been to a Macau casino? Tell us about Taiwan nightlife or travel in China, do you need a korean translation service to visit Korea? Tell us about it here, also you can share your pictures and youtube videos here aswell.

Thanks for that. I lost all my photos to my now ex-girlfriend. we spent 2 months in 1994. it doesn't look any different. more cars.

We took the bus, originally from Chengdu. After a week of gradual ascent we didn't notice the altitude at, what 4,000 m ?

The locals were very friendly, but afraid to talk about politics. back then we were free to roam, just catching a local bus and staying wherever. Samye was my favourite place. An ancient monastery surrounded by strip farming. No electricity and no running water. The toilet was on the roof of the only hotel. No walls or anything, just a view of the Himalaya. No roads, a boat across the river.

I remember seeing many hoopoes, a bird i had only seen in books. In Llahsa, men were selling animal pelts: Snow leopards and red pandas. Han Chinese tourists were buying them. I hated that.

It started getting cold at night in September, so we caught the monthly bus to the border with Nepal. the most picturesque two day bus journey ever.

In Northern India months later, after Q-ing for an hour to meet the Dalai Llama, my girlfriend showed him our diary with pictures of Tibet like yours, KW, and he autographed it, under a picture of the Potthala Palace.

WOW, thanks for the pics. I was last up in Tibet in 1986. We used to run mtn bike trips from Lhasa to Kathmandu. From your pics it does not seem the roads have imporved at all but actually seem worse. I had found memories of the place as in '84 we ran gold from HK to KTM via Lhasa and one trip had to spent a month in Lhasa as one of the pass's was closed south.

Do they still do the sky burial's? I assume the chinese stopped them. Can u still go inside the Jokang? One thing i recall that really pissed me off is ur supposed to circle the Jokang clockwise and the chinese used to link there arms and circle counter clockwise to piss off the Tibeatians. Is there still a market up there? Still have good Moslem soups?

I have heard that this practice has got much worse since the Chinese occupation. Tibetans used to sell these pelts before..I don't blame the Chinese for all problems in Tibet..However, the Chinese thirst for animal parts is a major player in this problem. Causing such a large escalation of the problem that these beautiful animals are becoming almost extinct..
It is a trade in which the Tibetans have found a niche as most jobs are given to the Chinese majority..(Chinese around 7-8million in Tibet..as opposed to 4-5million Tibetans from what I hear maximum numbers...and the Chinese are moving in thick and fast....Lhasa looks like a Chinese city..)

Please check out the Channel four UK dispatches program about life in Tibet...quite an eye opener.

I think they still do the sky burials, but its more of a tourist spectacal now.

Some remote places still do them..however the Chinese forces had banned them for many years..but the PRC aren't stupid and can see that...being seen to be preserving Tibets rich culture can be used as an advantage...politically.

ON my 1st trip on a bike When we crossed one 17,000 'passes we came upon a chinese guy on a chinese one speed thaty weighed at elast 100 lbs (compared to our 25 lbs bikes with 18 speeds) He had this giant cassette deck in a wooden box and had tapes in all the languages saying who he was and what he was doing. He had been on the road 4 years!! and still going strong. I couldn't push his bike much less pedal it!!

The month i spent in Lhasa i went to the sky burials a few times but out of respect never took a pictiure unlike many of the chinese who always were snapping away

very good! Wonderful photos. I've been wanting to get my buns to Tibet for decades. I feel a kinship with the place, and have written a version of the Milarepa story - is scheduled to get published in the States, along with an audio book version.
Question (this might sound daft). It appears there's a bus going to Lhasa from Kathmandu. Do you think it's possible (after getting a proper visa), to take the bus and simply get off at the first town past the border in to Tibet? (I don't know the name of the town). Methinks I might get in trouble, even if I were willing to hire a car from there - tho even that may be daydreaming. The reason: I want to explore the Tsampo valley which goes eastward from there (northern slopes of the Himalayas) which were the stomping grounds of Milarepa. Am most keen to try and find Marpa's compound. Even if it's not standing, there must be something still in evidence at that site. I've heard from a Russian acquaintance that the Tibetan tour guides will show you a place they call Marpa's compound, but it's not real. He says the real place is close to the border with Nepal, so it's made off-limits by the ever paranoid Chinese. ....just wondering.

Also, what would you recommend as the best times of year to make the trek? I assume anytimes beterrn May and September, but that's just off the top of my pointy head.

Question (this might sound daft). It appears there's a bus going to Lhasa from Kathmandu. Do you think it's possible (after getting a proper visa), to take the bus and simply get off at the first town past the border in to Tibet? (I don't know the name of the town). Methinks I might get in trouble, even if I were willing to hire a car from there - tho even that may be daydreaming.

Possible, but generally the buses and tourist agencies in Nepal are wary of upsetting China, so you'll find it difficult or impossible to do.

Not to mention that if you did succeed the Chinese might jail you, (as has recently happened to those 3 americans in Iran)